Johannesburg - Miners injured and arrested in the 2012 Marikana massacre are concerned that Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa most likely has been privy to the Farlam Commission’s report into the tragedy.
They fear that Ramaphosa could tamper with the report.
On Monday, the attorney representing the miners, Andries Nkome, filed an urgent application in the high court in Pretoria on behalf the miners and the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union, demanding that President Jacob Zuma release the report immediately.
Attached to the papers is a founding affidavit by Mzoxolo Magidiwana, one of the miners injured when the police opened fire at striking mineworkers who had gathered on a koppie at Lonmin’s Marikana platinum mine in North West, killing 34 of them.
“As it turns out, Ramaphosa, being a possible perpetrator and by virtue of being deputy president, has access to the report,” the affidavit states.
“It adds to our fears that the report may be interfered with, due to this unique and unusual situation.”
Magidiwana added it was unfair and discriminatory for the deputy president to see the report before the victims of the tragedy did.
Ramaphosa was a shareholder and non-executive director of Lonmin at the time of the wage-related strike. He had been accused of using his political influence to get the police to act against the striking workers.
E-mails sent by Ramaphosa to Lonmin management in the days leading up to the massacre were used as evidence in the commission of inquiry, which Zuma had set up to investigate the deaths. The inquiry was headed by retired Judge Ian Farlam.
In one of the e-mails, sent a day before the mass killing, Ramaphosa wrote: “The terrible events that have unfolded cannot be described as a labour dispute. They are plainly dastardly criminal and must be characterised as such. In line with this characterisation, there needs to be concomitant action to address this situation.”
Ramaphosa confirmed in other e-mails that he had spoken to the police minister at the time, Nathi Mthethwa, urging the police to “take appropriate steps”.
In his statement to the commission, Ramaphosa admitted that he had spoken to the then minister of mineral resources, Susan Shabangu, “to bring to her attention the increasing acts of violence taking place at Marikana, which in Lonmin’s view… were not going to be resolved without political intervention”.
However, during his testimony at the commission in August last year, Ramaphosa said that, as a non-executive board member, it was not his role to be involved in the daily management of the company and it was for those reasons that he did not get involved with wage talks.
“I should be flattered by the importance and influence that you think I had in this issue. When one is the non-executive director of the company, you deal with issues as they are presented to you by the executive members,” he testified.
Presidency spokesman Harold Maloka had not responded to questions at the time of publication.
The Star